“Why is everyone consumed with whether I am in love with my bride?” He raised a brow at her. “You know as well as I do my reasons for marriage. Why bring love into the matter?”
His mother sighed, rubbing at her temples. “For years, I’ve been hoping that you might fall in love. Is that such an unreasonable thing for a mother to wish for?”
“Formymother, yes.” He kissed her cheek. “Come now, why the melancholy? I have never aspired to a love match.”
“Your father and I—”
“We mere mortals cannot have your luck,” he teased. “But don’t feel sorry for me. I have a charmed life, and have the liberty to be extremely selfish, which is a privilege I do not take lightly. I shall do my best to give the name of Norfolk whatever honour I can, and I promise you I shall endeavour to be happy for the rest of my days. Is there a better promise I can make you than that?”
“Willyou be happy, Charles?” his mother asked, looking at him carefully. “That isn’t a promise you can make with abandon.”
“If not happy, then I shall at least strive for content. I feel reasonably confident I will succeed.”
“And now?” she pressed. “Are you content now?”
He thought of his life, the way he had fashioned it to be. What it would become. And, oddly, his mind strayed to Evelyn, and what she might answer if he were to ask that question. She would say that she was perfectly content, and she would mean it. And although he had said as much to his mother, the idea of Evelyn being only content when she deserved the greatest happiness made his stomach turn.
“I am perfectly content, Mama,” he said, his voice clipped. “As far as I am able, at least. Many have said that I do not possess a heart.”
She frowned a little as she reached past him to pour some tea. Her once-dark hair had greyed over the years. He remembered how he had been as a boy—and wondered how many of the greys might be attributed to him. “That answer does not satisfy me,” she said.
“I’m sorry to hear it. But if you think marriage is going to guarantee me happiness, I think you will be mistaken. It is duty, no more.”
“Perhaps,” she said. “But you are not heartless.”
“I’m more tempted to believe I am,” he said wryly, and rose. “I must be going. Are you meeting with your ladies again, plotting to take over the world in your drawing rooms?”
The corner of her mouth twitched. “Not domination, precisely. Rather, women’s suffrage.”
“Heavens, then I truly must depart or you might eat me alive for the crime of being born a man.”
“Not a crime,” she called after him. “A privilege. Remember that.”
So much of his life came from privilege. Even now, with this engagement chaining his hands, he knew he ought to feel lucky that he would be a duke, and that every mistake he had ever made had been cushioned by his father’s wealth and influence.
It was an invitation for recklessness. Selfishness. Boredom.
“Marriage should not just be about material gains,” his mother said as he left the room. “Even if you cannot love her, you should at least feel some affection for your partner in life.”
A fool’s dream. He left the house, knowing his next destination would be likely to bring him as much turmoil as that had.
The weather was especially cold, even for February, and Evelyn tucked her hands firmly in her muff as she walked beside Charles in the frigid winter air. The atmosphere between them seemed almost as chilly. He had arrived in a bad mood, and all her coaxing was not enough to prompt him from it. Even the prospect of a walk had done little to ease his scowling.
She sighed, her breath billowing white before her face, and glanced at the iron clouds overhead. A light snow had fallen overnight, casting the world in a romantically wintry hue, but wind promised snow, and being cold and wet wouldnotbe romantic.
“Perhaps we can go home,” she suggested. Better they try again another day—or perhaps the weather was a sign that she ought not to attempt it at all, and she should just accept his refusal.
To think it had come to this, that she—a lady of sense—had been tricked into putting her hopes into a collection of stone and mortar. She could hardly credit it. Perhaps she was mad. Loving Charles, in all his insolent, indolent, selfish glory, had finally compelled her to lose her mind.
The corner of his mouth twitched into a rueful smile as his gaze travelled across her face. “I’m atrocious company, aren’t I.”
“Yes, you are. And you do not even have the decency to pretend otherwise.”
A laugh barked from him. “I thought you hated all forms of dissemblance.”
“My preference is for you to enjoy my company enough towishto converse with me.”
“I’m sorry. You deserve better company on this horribly chilly afternoon.”
